1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus to eject/load a tray of an optical disk player mounted on a personal computer (PC), and more particularly, to a method and apparatus that ejects/loads a tray of an optical disk player using a digitizer or a keyboard connected to the PC even though an EJECT button is not installed on a control panel of the optical disk player.
2. Description of the Related Art
There are two methods for loading/ejecting an optical disk into/out of an optical disk player. One method is to use an EJECT button installed on a control panel of the optical disk player. The other method is an EJECT/LOAD command applied by the application software being used on a personal computer (PC), such as the WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER. In the former method, the EJECT button should be installed in the optical disk player. This adversely affects the freedom to design the optical disk player. In the latter method, an application program which controls the optical disk player should be installed on a PC. However, these application programs can be used only on condition that an optical disk has multimedia files, such as AUDIO-CD and VIDEO-CD.
In general, if the application program does not function, the tray of the optical disk player is ejected by pushing the EJECT button, the optical disk is loaded on the tray, and then the tray is inserted in the optical disk player by again pushing the EJECT button or by pushing the tray itself. Meanwhile, if the application program functions, the tray is ejected/loaded using either the EJECT button or executing the EJECT/LOAD command. If either there was not the application program installed or there was only a file without a multimedia file format, because the ejection/loading of the tray cannot be controlled in the application program, the EJECT button installed on an operation panel of the optical disk has to be used.
Likewise, in a conventional method for ejecting/loading a tray of an optical disk player, it is necessary to install the EJECT button on the control panel, and thus the freedom to design is limited and further increases costs.